


The Story I Want Is Your Screams

by LoveEffect



Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Blood, Blood and Injury, Blood and Violence, Caretaking, First Aid, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia is Bad at Feelings, Getting Together, Graphic Description, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Torture, Injury Recovery, Jaskier | Dandelion Has Feelings, Jaskier | Dandelion Has a Past, Jaskier | Dandelion Whump, M/M, Minor Character Death, Soft Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Torture, there's a reason this Viscount decided to become a travelling bard
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-03
Updated: 2020-03-03
Packaged: 2021-02-28 06:41:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22999369
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LoveEffect/pseuds/LoveEffect
Summary: Jaskier is gone when Geralt gets back from a wild goose chase of a hunt, and he thinks nothing of it until the barkeeper mentions that a man followed Jaskier out of town, galloping north. Once he catches up, he can't say he's appreciative of what they did to his bard.Inspired by Loki getting his mouth sewn shut in Norse mythology. But also it doesn't look like you think it'll look. They used an awl in the myth, they're using an awl here, the stitches don't cross over the lips. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 12
Kudos: 533





	The Story I Want Is Your Screams

**Author's Note:**

> Content warnings: the torture is not described, but the injuries sustained are. Minor character death, not described. The lip-sewing is not described, getting the thread out of his skin is described. Implied physical child abuse, not outright stated, only the scars left from it, not described emotionally.

When Geralt decides that a hunt will be too dangerous for Jaskier to be remotely nearby, he will simply leave. Either while Jaskier is distracted entertaining the patrons of the inn, or while Jaskier is asleep, but always swiftly and without breathing a word of his contract. He understands why, he really does. He wouldn't want to witness a fight with a bruxa, even if it would make good material, because she would absolutely find him and either hurt him or use him in order to hurt Geralt. So, he gets it. It still stings when he looks around for the witcher and golden eyes and only finds greedy faces and an empty stable.

It's usually a few days down the line when Geralt manages to return for his coin, and by that time Jaskier has moved on from necessity. No inn or tavern requires a bard for more than a few nights before they grow tired of the same voice running out of unique songs, and no innkeeper will tolerate a freeloading bard. Anywhere from a few days to a few weeks later their paths will cross again, and Jaskier will stick by Geralt's side like sap for months. Until Geralt gets another dangerous contract. Or maybe he just gets tired of Jaskier, which is a thought the bard doesn't enjoy entertaining.

Enjoyment or none, entertain the thought he does, and this time he leaves the next morning after Geralt disappears. He figures he can walk while the world is still damp and cool from the night and reach the next hospitable settlement before evening. He still lets the innkeeper know that if the witcher returns, he's headed north. The walk is quiet--no monsters, no brigands, no fellow travelers, save for a rider headed the same direction who passed him at a gallop ten minutes out of town. Simply a man walking in silence trying to sort the tangled threads of emotion balled in his chest into usable melodic motifs, which explains why he's so caught off guard when a man sitting outside a lone farmstead calls out to him.

"Ain't you that bard, hangs around that witcher fellow? That Butcher o' Blaviken?" he asks, huffing on a pipe. The thatching gives him shade from the midday sun, and the chimney above him gives off smoke. Jaskier slows down and perks up.

"In fact I am. I take it you've heard my ballad?" he asks with a smile. It's nice to be reminded that he's had an impact, that people might know him as well as those he writes about.

"Oh, aye. Toss a coin, very catchy." He pauses, puffing on his pipe. "Trade you a meal for a story," he says, and Jaskier's shoulders release from their usual proud position.

"Absolutely," he says enthusiastically, and he follows the man inside. As his eyes take a moment to adjust, he's grabbed from behind and his arms restrained. He can only give halfhearted, resigned curses as coarse rope bites into his wrists.

"The story I want," the man asks, dropping the rural cadence and speaking as clipped and efficient as a born and bred soldier, "is very simple." He picks up a mace from the table in the center of the room, and Jaskier can see quite a few different weapons upon it. He's hoisted up and can hear the fabric of his doublet being pierced, and when he's let go he realizes that he's been hung on a meat hook like a bled pig, and the man who tied him comes into view, scowling something nasty and taking a seat near the fire. The first man approaches, inspecting the sharp spikes of the mace. "Unfortunately, dead birds don't sing. Fortunately, there's quite a lot that won't kill you."

"Oh great, fantastic, very well thought out of you," Jaskier babbles in a panicked, breathy tenor. The man simply scoffs, and Jaskier stammers for a second. "Which story did you want? Because I'm afraid if this is an... information gathering assignment, I don't know much that isn't already published."

"Oh we already know everything, Julian Alfred Pankratz," he says, and Jaskier tries to swallow the panic as his probability of getting out of this alive starts dwindling. "Don't worry, you'll be returned to your loving family when we're finished," he says with a sarcastic sneer, and Jaskier's stomach sinks even further at the thought of returning to Kerack. A nice enough city, but his family... "We don't need to know anything," the man says, kindly interrupting Jaskier's thoughts. "You're not who we're after. You're just the bait. That's why we set a fake contract for a coven of bruxae." His smile is horrible as he comes even closer. "The story I want is your screams.”

* * *

Geralt returns to the inn after a night and most of the day searching the woods for any sign of his quarry, he is understandably in a rather bad mood. It isn't that he wanted to rid the world of a coven of bruxae, it's that the man who gave him the contract blatantly lied. The inn is crowded by patrons looking for supper, yet Jaskier has apparently already moved on, as there's no lute strings or trained voice or rambunctious singalong happening. It's only been one day, but Geralt can hardly fault the man for getting bored. He sighs and approaches the innkeeper to get some stew. Before he can ask, the innkeeper speaks.

"Your bard said he was heading north, just this morning," he says, then puts down the mug he was cleaning with a rag. His eyes dart around the room and he leans across the bar to speak in a low murmur. "I don't know if it matters, but a man followed him out and started riding the same direction. Hard. Could be nothing," he says, louder, leaning back and attending to the next dirty mug. "Thought you'd best know."

Stomach twisting into unidentifiable knots, Geralt places a few coins--quite a generous tip--onto the counter before turning away and leaving, face even stormier than before. He's not sure why he's as anxious as he was fighting a frightener with nothing but muscle memory for help, but he swings onto Roach and quickly urges her into a gallop.

Near a half hour later he draws her to a rough stop, ears pricking up at a sound he might not have even heard. Roach stays perfectly still, seeming to listen as well. When the faintest scream of pain echoes again, Geralt bares his teeth and digs his heels into Roach's sides. He leans over her neck and wills her to go faster as they sprint towards the noise. Roach pushes herself further a minute later when the screams stop.

Approaching a farmstead, he can smell the tang of blood coming from the hut. He pushes himself off Roach when they get close, and she immediately slows to a walk to approach a nearby stream. He draws his steel sword, hearing two strong heartbeats and one sluggish beat. They already know he's here, so he simply hits the door with Aard and steps in, growling low in his throat. He deflects the crossbow bolt of the far man with ease and he does not look at the familiar doublet or the blood dripping onto the unsteady wood floor. The fight is over in less than a minute and Geralt leaves his sword where it stands in a man's chest to turn to Jaskier.

His arms are tied behind him and his tunic is nearly soaked in red, with several tell-tale punctures in the fabric, and several in his breeches as well. His eyes flutter, only showing whites, right at the edge of unconsciousness, and his mouth... gods above. He cuts through the rope on Jaskier’s wrists with his knife and, as carefully as he can, he gently places his hands underneath Jaskier's arms and lifts him off the hook. He carefully adjusts his grip to cradle the bard in his arms and brings him to the bedroom, placing him on thankfully clean sheets. He strips the man of his doublet and undoes his breeches just enough to get the chemise free, look at the worst of the damage, though he wishes it was a different scenario. He takes a deep breath. Nothing is too deep or severe, but there's a lot. A few fractured ribs and he won't be able to walk for a while from the blows to his left thigh, but at least none of his organs are hemorrhaged.

He runs outside to rifle in Roach's saddlebags, murmuring that she's a good girl, and brings his pouch of medical supplies and a water skin inside. He moves a nearby table to be close by and sits on the edge of the bed when Jaskier groans in his throat, beginning to stir. Geralt quickly puts his hand under Jaskier's jaw and pushes slightly so he can't open his mouth.

"Don't talk Jaskier, don't try to talk, please don't move your lips because if you do it will hurt," he says, desperately looking into Jaskier's cornflower blue eyes for a hint of understanding. Jaskier blinks a couple times before nodding, but then he's struggling to keep his lips still as his face scrunches up, tears welling in his eyes and quickly overflowing. Geralt hushes him and murmurs as gently as he can about nothing, placing his forehead against Jaskier's as he wipes away tears.

"Do you want me to take the cord out first?" he asks, drawing back, and Jaskier nods emphatically. "It's a coarse thread," he warns. "It will hurt, and there's nothing I can do to make it not hurt." Jaskier just sniffs and clenches his jaw and nods again.

Geralt looks closely at what those idiots had done to Jaskier's mouth. It looks like they punched the thread through with an awl, leaving a bloody and bruising mess. He takes a breath and stands, quickly shrugging off his jerkin and taking his knife from his boot before sitting at Jaskier's side again.

"I need you to keep your head and face as still as possible, okay? If you move at all, I may accidentally cut you." Jaskier nods, and Geralt moves slowly, gently placing the blade on one of the four stitches that run parallel to Jaskier's upper lip, the thread only running vertical inside his mouth to connect to the loops parallel to his bottom lip. He presses slowly and gently and the cord gradually gives way. Once it fails completely, Jaskier whimpers as the coarse thread moves slightly in his skin. Geralt whispers platitudes and tries to move slightly faster without hurting Jaskier. Once the last thread is cut, he puts the knife on the table and grasps Jaskier's shoulder.

"I can pull them out one by one, which will be slower but will hurt less, I can pull them all out at once, which means it'll be over faster, or you can just open your mouth, which will only take half of them out but you'll be able to control the speed at which it happens." Geralt wishes that he'd thought to stock up on some kind of numbing herb for the next time Jaskier got injured.

Jaskier swallows and Geralt can see his lips move slightly before he's whining in frustration and looking to Geralt. He lifts an arm and mimes a yanking motion.

"All at once, and quickly?" Geralt guesses, and Jaskier nods, eyes betraying fear but jaw set. "I need you to be as relaxed as possible," he says, hovering his fingers over the uncut loops under Jaskier's bottom lip. "I'll count you down, alright?" He starts at five, and at three he hooks the loops and pulls them down.

Jaskier is screaming and bleeding and cursing and Geralt has gentle hands on his shoulder and the back of his neck repeating frantic apologies.

"People always tense up, I'm sorry, it had to be a surprise. If you tense up it causes more damage," he says, running a thumb under Jaskier's eye to catch the fresh tears. Jaskier simply curses a few more times before taking a few deep breaths as the burning subsides.

Geralt reaches over and picks up the waterskin, showing it to Jaskier. "If we can keep those clean, they shouldn't scar too bad," he says, and Jaskier just sighs in what seems to be resignation. Geralt frowns. The bard usually cares much more about the appearance of any wounds, especially ones that will be visible to the public eye.

Geralt helps Jaskier sit up and winces as blood sluggishly leaks from the mace punctures. He instructs Jaskier to take a mouthful of water and lean his head forward to let the water flush through the awl wounds, then begins wiping the blood off of Jaskier's torso, kneeling in front of the bard to make sure he got everything. He runs a hand gently over Jaskier's collar bone when he winces and squirms.

"You can spit," Geralt says, and reaches for his pouch, the poultice and clean linen that he only carries for Jaskier.

The bard is silent as Jaskier dresses and wraps his wounds, so Geralt forces the words out himself.

"How did they grab you?" he asks, and Jaskier looks to the side. "Blitz attack?" he prods after a pause. "Threats?”

"I walked in here myself," Jaskier says, voice a bit hoarse from all the screaming he'd done over the past few hours. "He recognized me and offered a meal for a story." His face is red and Geralt just sighs.

"Any other farmstead, and it would have been fine," he says. Jaskier just hums. "Did they say what they were trying to do?"

"Yeah," Jaskier says. "Kill you, using me as bait, then take me back to my family." He's unusually concise, and Geralt just looks up at him with a raised brow, and Jaskier sighs. "My parents are not... pleased with my career and reputation," he says haltingly, choosing his words with difficulty. Geralt nods and finishes wrapping the bandage.

He reaches to rub Jaskier's back but freezes as his fingers find delicately raised skin. He quickly rises, cursing himself for not checking Jaskier's back for injuries since there hadn't been any blood, but Jaskier's eyes don't hold any emotion, which is a completely alien look on him. Geralt finds only old scars, thin and faded, crossing his entire back. He lets out a soft "oh" and moves back to look Jaskier in the face.

He just looks up at the witcher, eyes showing nothing. "There's a reason I left," he says, and the witcher nods.

"I need to look at your leg now," he says, and suddenly his Jaskier is back with a wobbly smirk.

"What, the tragic backstory is too much so you're just skipping to getting into my breeches? I thought you had more class than that," he teases, and Geralt lets himself chuckle.

"What, is dressing your grave wounds not foreplay enough?" he teases back, gently nudging Jaskier's shoulders to get him to lie back down. He does, laughing the whole way down. Geralt gently begins to slide Jaskier's breeches off.

"You know," Jaskier says while looking at the ceiling. "Any time I imagined you taking off my clothes, it definitely wasn't to tend to a bleeding leg." He looks down at Geralt with a soft smile that makes his heart thump just a little bit faster.

"Yeah, well," Geralt says, grabbing the waterskin to clean Jaskier's leg. "Any time I imagined taking off your clothes, you weren't bloody and unconscious, whatever that's worth."

Jaskier tries to prop himself up on his elbows until Geralt warns him to stop wiggling around. "Worth quite a lot, actually," he says. Geralt doesn't pause in his dressing of his leg but simply hums a questioning tone. "Well I mean," he starts, then licks his lips. Geralt can hear his pulse picking up. "If we've both imagined you disrobing me for purposes other than injury, we should probably do something about that."

Geralt frowns as he ties off the bandage, and he stands to drag a blanket from the foot of the bed over Jaskier, who had started lightly shivering from the cooling air. "We don't have to," he says softly, an offered escape for Jaskier, who of course frowns in confusion and starts wriggling to look at Geralt again. "Stop that, you'll just hurt more tomorrow."

"Well then come here so I can see you," he exclaims, throwing his arms into the air. Geralt sits at Jaskier's hip, looking puzzled. "Why shouldn't we?" he asks, and Geralt looks at the wall.

"I'm just offering you a way out. You've been tortured and in a lot of pain, sometimes people say things they don't mean once the pain dies down," he says. Jaskier takes his hand and squeezes it, waiting for Geralt to look back at him.

"I have wanted you from the first time I saw you in Posada," Jaskier says bluntly. "I never said anything more than teasing flirtations because I am okay with whatever you can give, but if you want more from me and are willing to give more then by the gods, please give it. Preferably later, when I can actually move to enthusiastically reciprocate," he finishes with a roguish grin, which is quickly reduced to a small smirk as the wounds on his lips pull.

Geralt looks a bit overwhelmed, but presses Jaskier's hand to his lips.

"I'm gonna just go ahead and take that for a yes," Jaskier teases, and Geralt chuckles and nods. He runs light fingers over Jaskier's cheekbone, almost looking scared to break something invaluable.

"Try to sleep," he says. "I'm going to take care of Roach so we can continue north tomorrow, get to a proper inn." Jaskier hums, and Geralt sniffs. "I should probably move the bodies before they start properly decomposing," he says, and Jaskier makes a face.

"Ew, yeah, please do," he says, lightly patting Geralt's arm.

"I will be right back," he says emphatically. "I'll be just outside, I will be able to hear you. I am not leaving you without a word, alright? I won't do that again."

Jaskier gives a watery smile. "Do leave me behind if you're hunting a bruxa," he says to lighten the mood. "Those things freak me out."

Geralt chuckles. "As they should, songbird." Jaskier hums at the nickname, eyes already half lidded. Geralt brushes Jaskier's hair from his forehead where he places a soft kiss before getting up.


End file.
